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Feb. 27, 2004
Young couple slain in roadside shooting
Margot Dudkevitch
Eitan Kukoi, 30, and his wife, Rima Novikov, 27, were gunned down by terrorists as they drove on the Hebron-Beersheba road between Eshkolot and Sansana near the Green Line on Friday night.
Gunmen ambushed them from the roadside, then approached the vehicle, continuing to shoot the couple to ensure they were dead before fleeing to a waiting car and back into the West Bank, said police.
The two are survived by their two-year-old daughter, Michelle.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and Al-Aksa Martyrs Brigades both claimed responsibility for the murders, saying two gunmen were involved in the attack. A statement issued by the PFLP said the attack was a response to Israel’s "massacre" of the Palestinian people, and vowed to continue attacks in Israel.
Kukoi and Novikov, who lived in Livna-Shani, a settlement near the Green Line, were on their way to a birthday party in Ashdod. They had left their daughter at home with her grandmother.
Magen David Adom received a call at 8:24 p. m. and arrived within minutes, but the two were already dead. Police and security forces searched the scene for the gunmen; trackers spotted footprints leading toward the nearby Palestinian village of Ramadin.
Police said scores of Kalashnikov cartridge cases were found at the scene. Shalom Tobin, security head at the nearby Kibbutz Lahav, said the car was sprayed with bullets. "It was a terrible sight. It was clear they were shot at point-blank range," he said.
Southern District police chief Cmdr. Moshe Karadi told reporters there was more than one gunman. "We assessed that with the construction of the security fence in the North and Center of the country, terrorists would attempt to wage attacks in this area, which is not far from the south Hebron Hills; unfortunately it happened."
Kukoi’s sister, Tassia Levine, who also lives in Livna-Shani said she heard of the shooting on the radio, and when the color of the car was described and that a couple was shot, she feared the worst. "I prayed and prayed that it wasn’t them," she said.
Her brother and his wife moved to the community after Kukoi’s father died two years ago. "My parents built a large house 13 years ago, after my father died; Eitan and his wife moved into the house where they lived with our mother," she said.
The couple were to celebrate their daughter’s second birthday this week. "She knows something is wrong, she feels it. During the night she called out for her mother and father." Levine said she and her husband plan to adopt Michelle. Kukoi studied industry and management at Ben-Gurion University; Novikov studied civic policy at the Sapir Center.
Levine said that her family had considered leaving the community and moving to Beersheba. Now, they will do so immediately. "The Palestinians attain their goals, they kill us and force us to leave our communities," she said.
In Memoriam
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